Appearance of the Heavenly Demon - Chapter 28

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 28
* * *
Eleven wins, six losses.
The sparring matches between Gwan Hyeok and Yeon Woo continued without pause.
They had clashed seventeen times in total, and Gwan Hyeok claimed eleven of those victories.
An expected result.
After that first sparring match where he’d let Yeon Woo win too easily, Gwan Hyeok had shed his complacency.
He acknowledged Yeon Woo’s growth and approached each match with genuine intent.
The outcome: eleven wins, six losses.
Hah… hah… hah….
Gwan Hyeok watched Yeon Woo rise from the ground where he’d fallen, breathing heavily himself.
‘Honestly….’
Astounding.
Shockingly incredible.
He’d been studying Martial Arts for over five years now. Yet a child who’d trained for barely three months was matching him stride for stride.
Gwan Hyeok looked down at his hand gripping the wooden sword.
Not a single match had come easily.
In terms of pure victory and defeat, he held the advantage—but the problem was that none of his wins felt clean.
‘Is this… talent…?’
Could it be that legendary Martial Talent everyone spoke of in whispers?
This boy who’d been nothing but a beggar mere weeks ago?
Unbelievable, and yet he had no choice but to believe it.
To mock such growth in merely three months would be absurd—and Gwan Hyeok, of all people, knew Yeon Woo’s level three months prior better than anyone.
“Again.”
Gwan Hyeok rose to his feet, wiped his nose with a swift motion, and looked at Yeon Woo, who had already propped his axe upright beside him.
‘The most terrifying thing is that insane stamina of his.’
What kind of child didn’t know fatigue?
Unlike Gwan Hyeok, whose breath came up to his throat and left him gasping, Yeon Woo didn’t seem winded at all.
One deep breath and he found his composure again.
Every time Gwan Hyeok witnessed that impossible recovery, his fighting spirit crumbled.
‘But….’
The corners of Gwan Hyeok’s mouth curled upward in a grin.
His hand tightened on the wooden sword.
“As many as you like.”
This was fun.
Fun enough to drive him mad.
How long had it been since he’d sparred with someone his own age, with comparable skill? Had he ever done so before?
He’d only ever trained with Baek Gang, whose oblige felt hollow and obvious. But fighting desperately against an evenly matched opponent….
‘This is really fun.’
The hunger to win made his eyes gleam, and when he succeeded, his entire body trembled with exhilaration.
‘Keep going.’
He wanted to keep going. Really.
“Are you sure about this? You don’t look well.”
“I’m fine. I’ll beat you easily this time.”
“We’ll see.”
Even as his breath grew ragged and his body screamed in pain, Gwan Hyeok found himself hurling a taunt.
And that was.
“Don’t cry even if you lose, understood?”
Yeon Woo was no different.
Always by a hair’s breadth.
The victories and defeats continued to be decided by the narrowest of margins.
The moment he thought he’d seized the advantage, his movements lagged fractionally behind, or he fell for his opponent’s feint, or made a mistake in form.
There were many reasons, but the victory that remained forever just beyond reach tormented Yeon Woo with impatience.
And the occasional victories that did come.
Their thrill and sweetness, far from sating his hunger, only inflamed it further—and that flame kept lifting Yeon Woo back to his feet.
Whooooosh—
A cool breeze swept between the two boys, one wielding a sword, the other an axe.
Un Hyeon, who had begun as a referee but had somewhere become merely part of the scenery, wore nothing but a pleased smile.
Heh heh.
‘Such youthful vigor.’
He had a friend to share his skill with, and the vigor and spirit to frolic as freely as he wished—how could he not leap with joy?
It was a good time. A good time indeed.
And so he laughed, gazing upward at the azure sky.
“…!”
The gentle curve of his eyes sharpened in an instant, growing keen and alert.
A single bird wheeling through that vast expanse had entered his field of vision.
Swoosh—
“So your name is Baek Gang.”
“…!”
Baek Gang, who had been standing with arms crossed watching the two children spar, spun around at once.
The old man who had clearly been standing across from him moments before was now gripping his shoulder.
Baek Gang’s eyes trembled visibly.
‘I didn’t sense him move at all.’
But when had he…?
Had this man been an enemy, Baek Gang’s head would long since have been driven into the earth.
Baek Gang fought to conceal his tension as he spoke.
“What is it, sir?”
“I have somewhere to go for a time. Can you watch over the children?”
Baek Gang’s brow furrowed as he met the cool, settled gaze within the black half-mask.
Then he gave a brief nod.
In that same instant, the old man’s form vanished before his eyes.
“…!”
Baek Gang spun quickly, his gaze snapping toward the gate.
Whoosh—
A fierce wind swept past him from behind, sending his hair and robes billowing.
The old man’s presence had already vanished.
The children, locked in their heated sparring match, had not even noticed his disappearance—a movement so ghostly, so utterly uncanny.
* * *
Crackle-crackle— crackle-snap-snap—
Un Hyeon pushed through the undergrowth, moving swiftly.
His gaze remained fixed on the sky above.
A bird wheeled overhead, the distance between them neither closing nor widening, as if keeping pace with him as he ran.
Un Hyeon knew that bird.
‘Cheongmae.’
A hawk his son Namgung Ho-yeon had raised since childhood.
Because he had watched over the hawk from its days as a chick, Un Hyeon had always known it well.
Though it answered only Ho-yeon’s commands, it remembered the faces of all the Namgung household, and with its sharp memory served faithfully as a messenger hawk and tracking hawk.
‘The presence of Cheongmae means…’
His son was somewhere near.
Yet Cheongmae was a bird capable of traveling the city alone at command.
That is, without knowing exactly how close Ho-yeon was or where precisely he stood, Un Hyeon could not simply follow blindly.
So for now—
Whistle—!
Un Hyeon, having crossed a mountain away from Yeon Woo’s House and traveled far, let out a sharp whistle.
At that, Cheongmae, which had been following Un Hyeon all this while, descended swiftly toward him.
Un Hyeon extended his arm toward the hawk.
Cheongmae landed on his arm with familiar ease.
“Cheongmae…”
How he longed for Namgung—for his son—that even this hawk the boy had raised had become so precious to him.
Having left his homeland and crossed the line between life and death in this strange land, the trace of home he had found brought tears welling to his eyes.
Un Hyeon suppressed the emotions burning hot within him for a long while, stroking Cheongmae’s head gently.
And so time passed.
As the tumult of feeling subsided, cold reason posed a question within his mind.
‘Can Ho-yeon be trusted?’
What did his son think of him, his own father?
When they spoke, when they ate together—what expression had that boy worn? What had he said?
Un Hyeon found himself retracing the memories he had shared with Ho-yeon.
Were there any suspicious actions or words? Any sign of discomfort?
“…”
As his thoughts continued, Un Hyeon quietly closed his eyes.
‘How foolish.’
Truly foolish, to doubt even his own son, to rake through memories they’d shared like this.
Namgung Ho-yeon was—his son was.
A child he loved enough to name as the one person he could trust above all others.
No—even if the boy had somehow taken part in betraying him, if it was his son’s will, he could have gone to his death gladly.
As a father, Un Hyeon could have done that.
“Send word to Ho-yeon.”
Un Hyeon tied a note to Cheongmae’s leg, one marked with a sign that he lived.
He raised his arm, and Cheongmae lifted off at once, great wings beating the air.
The bird circled twice above Un Hyeon’s head before disappearing into the distance.
Un Hyeon found himself remembering the words of the Dark Shadow Demon Army.
“The lackey…”
That lackey had been his own son.
His own son…
‘He’s searching for me.’
He’s come all this way to find this worthless father of his.
Un Hyeon watched the bird disappear into the distance, and bitterness lingered on his face.
Long after Cheongmae vanished, Un Hyeon remained in place before finally turning to leave.
* * *
“In a month!”
“You’re on!”
“We’ll spar again in a month!”
“You’re on!”
“You hear me?!”
“You’re on!”
Covered in dirt and bruises, disheveled beyond measure, Gwan Hyeok and Yeon Woo sealed their promise for the next bout.
Final tally: Gwan Hyeok thirty-two victories, Yeon Woo seventeen.
Both boys had given their all, pouring every ounce of strength into their sparring match.
Their fire would have burned through the night if not for Baek Gang, Gwan Hyeok’s escort, finally calling a halt.
“Train hard!”
“I will!”
The two boys parted ways with brighter faces than ever before.
So many sparring rounds had left Gwan Hyeok’s party with no time for supper, hurrying away instead.
“That was fun!”
Yeon Woo laughed, a bright giggle, finished seeing them off, and came back inside.
Though the sparring had ended, running it through his mind again and again—it had been fun.
“Next time I’ll have to win more matches.”
I’ll have to stuff it in his face.
With such thoughts, he crossed the yard and ran into Un Hyeon emerging from the back garden with dinner preparations.
Yeon Woo’s face brightened.
“Grandfather! When I was sparring today, I—”
“Ah, Yeon Woo. We’ve run out of firewood.”
“Oh? Really?”
“Supper’s running late, so would you mind preparing it?”
“Huh?”
A moment of hesitation flickered across Yeon Woo’s face.
But he quickly nodded with vigor.
“Yep! Leave it to me!”
Yeon Woo dashed toward the back garden.
Like always, the boy who ran off with rapid footsteps was not smiling.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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